University of Virginia Library

3. CHAPTER III.
MIRANDY, HANK, AND SHOCKY.

MIRANDY had nothing but contempt for the
new master until he developed the bull-dog in
his character. Mirandy fell in love with the
bull-dog. Like many other girls of her class, she
was greatly enamored with the “subjection of
women,” and she stood ready to fall in love with any man strong
enough to be her master. Much has been said of the strong-minded
women. I offer this psychological remark as a contribution
to the natural history of the weak-minded women.

It was at the close of that very second day on which Ralph
had achieved his first victory over the school, and in which
Mirandy had been seized with her desperate passion for him,
that she told him about it. Not in words. We do not allow
that in the most civilized countries, and it would not be tolerated
in Hoopole County. But Mirandy told the master the
fact that she was in love with him none the less that no word
passed her lips. She walked by him from school. She cast at
him what are commonly called sheep's-eyes. Ralph thought
them more like calf's-eyes. She changed the whole tone of
her voice. She whined ordinarily. Now she whimpered. And
so by ogling him, by blushing at him, by tittering at him, by
giggling at him, by snickering at him, by simpering at him, by

[ILLUSTRATION]

MIRANDY MEANS.

[Description: 556EAF. Page 027. In-line engraving of the head and shoulders of a grinning girl holding a book, on whose cover can be seen the words Webster's Elementary Book. ] making herself tenfold more a fool even than nature had made
her, she managed to convey to the dismayed soul of the young
teacher the frightful intelligence that he was loved by the
richest, the ugliest, the silliest, the coarsest, and the most entirely
contemptible girl in Flat Creek district.

Ralph sat by the fire the next morning trying to read a few
minutes before school-time, while the boys were doing the
chores, and the bound girl was milking the cows, with no one
in the room but the old woman. She was generally as silent
as Bud, but now she seemed for some unaccountable reason
disposed to talk. She had sat down on the broad hearth to

have her usual morning smoke; the poplar table, adorned by
no cloth, sat in the floor; the unwashed blue tea-cups sat in
the unwashed blue saucers; the unwashed blue plates kept
company with the begrimed blue pitcher. The dirty skillets
by the fire were kept in countenance by the dirtier pots, and
the ashes were drifted and strewn over the hearth-stones in a
most picturesque way.

“You see,” said the old woman, knocking the residuum from
her cob-pipe, and chafing some dry leaf between her withered
hands preparatory to filling it again, “you see, Mr. Hartsook,
my ole man's purty well along in the world. He's got a right
smart lot of this world's plunder, one way and another.” And
while she stuffed the tobacco in her pipe Ralph wondered why
she should mention it to him. “You see we moved in here
nigh upon twenty-five year ago. 'Twas when my Jack, him as
died afore Bud was born, was a baby. Bud'll be twenty-one
the fifth of next June.”

Here Mrs. Means stopped to rake a live coal out of the fire
with her skinny finger, and then to carry it in her skinny
palm to the bowl—or to the hole—of her cob-pipe. When she
got the smoke agoing she proceeded:

“You see this ere bottom land was all Congress land in them
there days, and it sold for a dollar and a quarter, and I says
to my ole man, `Jack,' says I, `Jack, do you git a plenty
while you're a gittin'. Git a plenty while you're a gittin',' says
I, `fer 'twon't never be no cheaper'n 'tis now,' and it ha'n't
been, I knowed 'twouldn't,” and Mrs. Means took the pipe
from her mouth to indulge in a good chuckle at the thought of
her financial shrewdness. “`Git a plenty while you're a gittin','
says I. I could see, you know, they was a powerful sight of

[ILLUSTRATION]

"GIT A PLENTY WHILE YOUR'E A GITTIN'," SAYS I.

[Description: 556EAF. Page 029. In-line engraving of seated woman in a cap and apron holding a corncob pipe.] money in Congress land. That's what made me say, `Git a
plenty while you're a gittin'.' And Jack, he's wuth lots and
gobs of money, all made out of Congress land. Jack didn't
git rich by hard work. Bless you, no! Not him. That a'n't
his way. Hard work a'n't, you know. 'Twas that air six hundred
dollars he got along of me, all salted down into Flat Crick
bottoms at a dollar and a quarter a acre, and 'twas my sayin'
`Git a plenty while you're a gittin” as done it.” And here the
old ogre laughed, or grinned horribly, at Ralph, showing her
few straggling, discolored teeth.

Then she got up and knocked the ashes out of her pipe,
and laid the pipe away and walked round in front of Ralph.
After adjusting the “chunks” so that the fire would burn, she
turned her yellow face toward Ralph, and scanning him closely
came out with the climax of her speech in the remark: “You
see as how, Mr. Hartsook, the man what gits my Mirandy'll
do well. Flat Crick land's worth nigh upon a hundred a acre.”

This gentle hint came near knocking Ralph down. Had Flat
Creek land been worth a hundred times a hundred dollars an
acre, and had he owned five hundred times Means's five hundred
acres, he would have given it all just at that moment to have
annihilated the whole tribe of Meanses. Except Bud. Bud was
a giant, but a good-natured one. He thought he would except
Bud from the general destruction. As for the rest, he mentally
pictured to himself the pleasure of attending their funerals.
There was one thought, however, between him and despair.
He felt confident that the cordiality, the intensity, and the persistency
of his dislike of Sis Means were such that he should
never inherit a foot of the Flat Creek bottoms.

But what about Bud? What if he joined the conspiracy to
marry him to this weak-eyed, weak-headed wood-nymph, or
backwoods nymph?

If Ralph felt it a misfortune to be loved by Mirandy Means,
he found himself almost equally unfortunate in having incurred
the hatred of the meanest boy in school. “Hank” Banta, low-browed,
smirky, and crafty, was the first sufferer by Ralph's
determination to use corporal punishment, and so Henry Banta,
who was a compound of deceit and resentment, never lost an
opportunity to annoy the young school-master, who was obliged
to live perpetually on his guard against his tricks.

One morning, as Ralph walked toward the school-house, he
met little Shocky. What the boy's first name or last name
was the teacher did not know. He had given his name as
Shocky, and all the teacher knew was that he was commonly
called Shocky, that he was an orphan, that he lived with a
family named Pearson over in Rocky Hollow, and that he was
the most faithful and affectionate child in the school. On this
morning that I speak of, Ralph had walked toward the school
early to avoid the company of Mirandy. But not caring to
sustain his dignity longer than was necessary, he loitered along
the road, admiring the trunks of the maples, and picking up a
beech-nut now and then. Just as he was about to go on
toward the school, he caught sight of little Shocky running
swiftly toward him, but looking from side to side, as if afraid
of being seen.

“Well, Shocky, what is it?” and Ralph put his hand kindly
on the great bushy head of white hair from which came
Shocky's nickname. Shocky had to pant a minute.

“Why, Mr. Hartsook,” he gasped, scratching his head,
“they's a pond down underneath the school-house,” and here
Shocky's breath gave out entirely for a minute.

“Yes, Shocky, I know that. What about it? The trustees
haven't come to fill it up, have they?”

“Oh! no, sir; but Hank Banta, you know—” and Shocky
took another breathing spell, standing as close to Ralph as he
could, for poor Shocky got all his sunshine from the master's
presence.

“Has Henry fallen in and got a ducking, Shocky?”

“Oh! no, sir; he wants to git you in, you see.”

“Well, I won't go in, though, Shocky.”

“But, you see, he's been and gone and pulled back the
board that you have to step on to git ahind your desk; he's
been and gone and pulled back the board so as you can't help
a-tippin' it up, and a-sowsin' right in ef you step there.”

“And so you came to tell me.” There was a huskiness in
Ralph's voice. He had, then, one friend in Flat Creek district
—poor little Shocky. He put his arm around Shocky just a moment,
and then told him to hasten across to the other road,
so as to come back to the school-house in a direction at right
angles to the master's approach. But the caution was not
needed. Shocky had taken care to leave in that way, and was
altogether too cunning to be seen coming down the road with
Mr. Hartsook. But after he got over the fence to go through
the “sugar camp” (or sugar orchard, as they say at the East),
he stopped and turned back once or twice, just to catch one
more smile from Ralph. And then he hied away through the
tall trees a very happy boy, kicking and plowing the brown
leaves before him in his perfect delight, saying over and over
again, “How he looked at me! how he did look!” And when
Ralph came up to the school-house door, there was Shocky
sauntering along from the other direction, throwing bits of
limestone at fence-rails, and smiling still clear down to his
shoes at thought of the master's kind words.

“What a quare boy Shocky is!” remarked Betsey Short, with
a giggle. “He just likes to wander 'round alone. I see him
a-comin' out of the sugar camp just now. He's been in there half
an hour.” And Betsey giggled again. For Betsey Short could
giggle on slighter provocation than any other girl on Flat Creek.

When Ralph Hartsook, with the quiet, dogged tread that he
was cultivating, walked into the school-room, he took great care

not to seem to see the trap set for him. But he carelessly
stepped over the board that had been so nicely adjusted. The
boys who were Hank's confidants in the plot were very busy
over their slates, and took pains not to show their disappointment.

The morning session wore on without incident. Ralph several
times caught two people looking at him. One was Mirandy.
Her weak and watery eyes stole loving glances over the top of
her spelling-book, which she would not study. Her looks always
made Ralph's spirits sink to forty below zero, and congeal.

But on one of the backless little benches that sat in the
middle of the school-room was little Shocky, who also cast
many love-glances at the young master, glances as grateful to
his heart as Mirandy's ogling—he was tempted to call it ogring
—was hateful.

“Look at Shocky,” giggled Betsey Short, behind her slate.
“He looks as if he was a-goin' to eat the master up, body and
soul.”

It is safe to conjecture that Betsey had never studied “Drew
on the Immateriality and Immortality of the Human Soul,” or
she would not have spoken of Ralph's as if it were something
to be swallowed like an oyster.

And so the forenoon wore on as usual, and those who had
laid the trap had forgotten it themselves. The morning session
was drawing to a close. The fire in the great, old fire-place
had burnt low. The flames, which seemed to Shocky to be
angels, had disappeared, and now the bright coals, which had
played the part of men and women and houses in Shocky's
fancy, had taken on a white and downy covering of ashes, and
the great half-burnt back-log lay there smoldering like a giant
asleep in a snow-drift. Shocky longed to wake him up.

As for Henry Banta, he was too much bothered to get the
answer to a “sum” he was doing, to remember anything about
his trap. In fact, he had quite forgotten that half an hour ago
in the all-absorbing employment of drawing ugly pictures on
his slate and coaxing Betsey Short to giggle by showing them
slily across the school-room. Once or twice Ralph had been
attracted to Betsey's extraordinary fits of giggling, and had come
so near to catching Hank that the boy thought it best not to run
any farther risk of the beech switches, four or five feet long, laid
up behind the master in sight of the school as a prophylactic.
Hence his application just now to his sum in long division, and
hence his puzzled look, for, idler that he was, his “sums” did
not solve themselves easily. As usual in such cases, he came up
in front of the master's desk to have the difficulty explained.
He had to wait a minute until Ralph got through with showing
Betsey Short, who had been seized with a studying fit, and who
could hardly give any attention to the teacher's explanations, she
did want to giggle so much! Not at anything in particular, but
just at things in general.

While Ralph was “doing” Betsey's sum for her, he was solving
a much more difficult question. A plan had flashed upon
him, but the punishment seemed a severe one. He gave it up
once or twice, but he remembered how turbulent the Flat Creek
elements were; and had he not inly resolved to be as unrelenting
as a bull-dog? He fortified himself by recalling again
the oft-remembered remark of Bud, “Ef Bull wunst takes a holt,
heaven and yarth can't make him let go.” And so he resolved
to give Hank and the whole school one good lesson.

“Just step round behind me, Henry, and you can see how I
do this,” said Ralph.

Hank was entirely off his guard, and with his eyes fixed upon
the slate on the teacher's desk, he sidled round upon the broad
loose board, misplaced by his own hand, and in an instant the
other end of the board rose up in the middle of the school-room,
almost striking Shocky in the face, while Henry Banta brought
up or down in the ice-cold water beneath the school-house.

“Why, Henry!” cried Ralph, jumping to his feet with well-feigned
surprise. “How did this happen?” and he helped the
dripping fellow out and seated him by the fire.

Betsey Short giggled.

Shocky was so tickled that he could hardly keep his seat.

The boys who were in the plot looked very serious indeed.
And a little silly.

Ralph made some remarks by way of improving the occasion.
He spoke strongly of the utter meanness of the one who could
play so heartless a trick on a schoolmate. He said that it was
as much thieving to get your fun at the expense of another as to
steal his money. and while he talked all eyes were turned on
Hank. All except the eyes of Mirandy Means. They looked
simperingly at Ralph. All the rest looked at Hank. The fire
had made his face very red. Shocky noticed that. Betsey Short
noticed it, and giggled. The master wound up with an appropriate
quotation from Scripture. He said that the person who
displaced that board had better not be encouraged by the success—he
said success with a curious emphasis—of the present
experiment to attempt another trick of the kind. For it was
set down in the Bible that if a man dug a pit for the feet of
another he would be very likely to fall in it himself. Which
made all the pupils look solemn. Except Betsey Short. She
giggled. And Shocky wanted to. And Mirandy cast an expiring

look at Ralph. And if the teacher was not love-sick, he
certainly was sick of Mirandy's love.

When school was “let out” Ralph gave Hank every caution
that he could about taking cold, and even lent him his overcoat,
very much against Hank's will. For Hank had obstinately refused
to go home before the school was dismissed.

Then the master walked out in a quiet and subdued way to
spend the noon recess in the woods, while Shocky watched his
retreating footsteps with loving admiration. And the pupils not
in the secret canvassed the question of who moved the board.
Bill Means said he'd bet Hank did it, which set Betsey Short
off in an uncontrollable giggle. And Shocky listened innocently.

But that night Bud said silly, “Thunder and lightning! what
a manager you air, Mr. Hartsook!” To which Ralph returned
no reply except a friendly smile. Muscle paid tribute to brains
that time.

But Ralph had no time for exultation. For just here came the
spelling-school.